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The Summer
After making the decision to stay with Olympique Lyonnais news had emerged from the club in to the media and more and more fans were made aware of what happened. My receptionist would knock every morning with a bigger handful of envelopes than the previous day, “Fan Mail”, she’d say and I would spend at least an hour opening and trying to read each one but I realised it was just more and more thank you letters for not leaving.
The fans appreciated me and what I had done for this club and that felt good. I knew I had made the right decision and now it was time to move on and make the most of the summer ahead, preparing for the new season.
The biggest issue to address was whether players would be leaving the squad. I had already made some transfers and players were about to join us in a months time but with some new faces it was time to work out whom, if any, would be leaving. With the emergence of
Prince Boateng and already having
Marcos Rojo, Dejan Lovren and
Samuel Umtiti as first team centre backs,
Bakary Kone’s time at Lyon was up and Sevilla snapped him up for a healthy €10 million. 4 more players left for a combined fee of €1.25 million, shifting some unwanted players, while 6 players left the club on free transfers. The biggest departure was
Guida Fofana for €20 million to P$G. He joined the same day P$G spent €19 million signing
Sven Bender from Chelsea and is competing with 7 other players all very capable of starting in the same position as him. A great bit of transfer work for Lyon in my opinion.
1st July 2013 arrived and
Luis Martinez Poch (€5 million),
Kwadwo Asamoah (Free) and
Abdelaziz Aissaoui (Free) joined the club. This was great news as it meant we had cover ready to play in defence and midfield.
Carlos Fierro returned from his loan spell at Roma and would also join the first team squad but I am unsure as to whether we will hold on to him before the season is over.
Gaddy Zagano has impressed while
Yassine Benzia has grown immensely.
Alexandre Lacazette is an exceptional team player and
Tony Watt has already proven himself so
Fierro could well find himself on the way out. With 8 players out on loan and several in the youth team showing fantastic potential the need for transfers is minimised at this moment in time, as well as having the youngest squad in the league. These 3 players joining us concluded our business in the transfer window and we were now able to focus on getting ready for the start of the season, with our Trophee des Champions match coming up soon!